Natural capitalism: path to sustainability?
L.
Hunter Lovins1
The late twentieth century is witnessing two great intellectual shifts.
The first
is the fall of Communism, with the apparent triumph of market economics.
The
second, now emergent in a rapidly...
More
Natural capitalism: path to sustainability?
L.
Hunter Lovins1
The late twentieth century is witnessing two great intellectual shifts.
The first
is the fall of Communism, with the apparent triumph of market economics.
The
second, now emergent in a rapidly growing number of businesses, is the end of the
war against the earth, with the eventual competitive victory of a new form of
economics we call Natural Capitalism.
The term ‘Natural Capitalism’ emphasizes that industrial capitalism, as it is
now practiced, is unnatural—is an aberration.
It is defying its own logic.
It does not
value, but rather is liquidating, the most important forms of capital, especially natural
capital—the biological world whose resources and ecosystem services make
possible all life.
According to a pioneering analysis of the world’s ecosystems
prepared by the United Nations, the World Bank and the World Resources Institute
(2000)2
: ‘There are considerable signs that the capacity of ecosystems, the
biologic
Less
